Colton Rasmussen, Jacob O’Connell, Madz Brooks, Abby Cleator
*all authors contributed equally to this paper
Western Washington University
MGMT 311: Organizational Behavior
Dr. Warren
February 25, 2020
The accounting industry has stayed fairly similar since the creation of double entry bookkeeping. Technology has come along and made recording data and calculating results much easier, but nothing has changed the field in very dramatic ways. People have pretty much known what to expect working in the accounting field. Now though, technology has moved beyond increasing the convenience of recording data, technology can often do parts of the job on its own.
Artificial intelligence is changing the way accountants do their jobs and often what their job actually entails. For some who have been in the industry for a while this can seem like a scary and bad thing. For those beginning their career it is something they are very likely already familiar with. Artificial intelligence is having an effect on accountants and this effect will only continue to increase. One thing this technology always effects is interaction between accountants.
A German based software firm Smacc, has created a program that has had a dramatic effect in the industry especially for small businesses. They help companies automate their accounting systems. The program transmits receipts, records them, encrypts them, and then sorts them in the proper accounts (Smacc, 2018). The program even arranges these accounts into different files for different users. All of this changes the roles and overall function that accountants play in these businesses.
More technologically inclined people have explored the impacts these advances have had on the industry, we are going to explore the human interaction side of the equation. An interesting thing to consider when it comes to technology performing tasks on its own is what that means for humans. It makes us examine what we are good at and what technology is doing better, this can be an uncomfortable thing. Steve Sutton and Vicky Arnold are exploring these changes in the industry, what those changes mean concerning expertise, and what that word actually means now (Sutton, Arnold, 2018).
Expertise implies someone has a set of knowledge and abilities in a certain area that allow them to perform above average. AI has strengths and weaknesses and one of the strengths of AI is its ability to perform with rapid expertise in a narrow area. This is similar to human expertise and requires us to think about what we should focus on. Sutton and Arnold argue that humans are not going to win the battle with AI for expertise. We need to ask then, what are humans good at that AI is not? The answer is interaction and synthesization across domains.
This raises the issue of how to balance the different abilities of employees in the accounting domain. There are three major age groups that make up our current working class, these groups are the Baby Boomers, Gen Xers and Millennials. Each age group has their own unique views and opinions which makes maintaining a diverse balance between the groups essential to a well-functioning firm. Automation has caused a change in this balance and in many places has led to unequal representation of the Gen X age group. Jay Fitzgerald’s article discusses the correlation between aging workforces and the usage rates of robots. Research has shown that countries with a greater proportional decrease in middle-aged workers compared to older workers, are more likely to invest in robotics (Fitzgerald, 2018). In a field like accounting that is going to be heavily affected by automation we could see a similar distribution of age groups.
As more automation occurs management will have to be more selective in who to keep and who to hire. Throughout this process ageism and diversity must be considered. An article by Rider university reveals strategies to combat these potential problems and create a diverse work culture. One strategy is to monitor ageism in the hiring process. It may be tempting to hire a large amount of younger technologically adept employees, but this can cause problems too. Although they may be more comfortable working with new technology, their lack of experience can lead them to making ill-advised decisions. Another downfall of hiring too many employees in the same age group is communication between employees. Different age groups prefer to communicate in certain ways, and some may feel alienated if their age group is underrepresented (Rider University). One solution to this problem could be up training of your current employees, then the balance of groups would remain the same.
A company may prefer to hire younger employees to cut down on these retraining costs or even think that their older employees are incapable of learning new ways of operation. This is faulty thinking.
In a reflection upon a French Study (Delgoulet, C.), it was stressed that while older employees take longer to learn new things, they are just as capable of learning as younger hires and if taught in the right manner can surpass younger hires in their mastery of new technology. It is still always within a company’s interest to retrain existing employees over hiring new ones, no matter the age. Just because technology comes easy to the Gen Xer does not mean that they will always be better with it, it only means that they have already been trained in it, your older hires can be too. Age does not hinder the learning process it only makes the path towards learning look a little different.
Company’s should look at each of their employees as unique individuals and invest in each of them as they would their assets. While older employees will need more time to learn new technologies and may need to be trained in a different way, their expertise within the field and history in the company are worth the extra hours of training. Each employee, no matter their age, has their own unique learning styles and pace, age is never the issue. While the technological advances of late have been drastic, employers should keep in mind that technology will forever be changing. And if they invest in their employees, they will be able to grow and rise to any challenge.